17 Romanians died and 31 were left injured after their bus fell off a bridge into a ravine in Montenegro on Sunday evening. The bus was carrying 46 tourists and two drivers. (scroll down for photos).

According to the Romanian media, most of the tourists were elderly who were scheduled to spend their holiday on a tour to Serbia and Montenegro. They left Romania Saturday morning and made a first stop in the Serbian capital of Belgrade where they were accommodated. All passenger on the bus were Romanian nationals.

The authorities in Montenegro revealed that the tragedy emerged at the exit of a tunnel followed by a bridge as the driver lost control of the vehicle which smashed the rail-guard on the roadside and crashed about 50 meters into a gorge near the river Moraca. The accident occurred at around 17:00 local time (CET) on E65 highway in a mountainous region near Grlo about 30 kilometers north of capital Podgorica. Montenegro Minister of Interior Rasko Konjevic said “sadly, this death toll could rise further” because 7 of the passengers were badly injured.

Rescuers try to pull the victims from a deep ravine where a Romanian bus crashed on Sunday (Credit: portalanalitika.me)

The cause of the tragic incident is not clear so far, but the narrow European route E65 which points to the Adriatic coast of Montenegro is known to be notorious for the overwhelming number of deadly car crashes.

One of the passengers who escaped the drama said that before the accident the driver was performing an overtake right at the entrance on the viaduct and although the speed limit was 50 km/h, the bus was running about 90 km/h.

Montenegro website Vijesti.me has revised the death toll to 18 and the Romanian news outlets to 19.

The crash of a coach carrying Romanian tourists in Montenegro left 17 people dead and 31 seriously wounded (Credit: Dragana Šćepanović / www.vijesti.me)

The wounded were taken to hospitals in Podgorica.

“Most people, including also a child, have very serious injuries,” said Vladimir Dobricanin, -a doctor from a Podgorica hospital-, for the Montenegrin state television RTGC.

The trip was organized by “Marea Travel” and the bus was operated by the transport company Gregory Tour.